Bringing new ideas to housing research

This paper makes a plea for a new form of international comparative housing research, in which not countries (national housing regimes) but cities or regions (local housing regimes) are the unit of analysis. Why do we need such a new comparative research approach? How can a local housing regime be conceptualised? By answering these questions, the paper attempts to lay the conceptual foundation for international comparative housing research 2.0.

The Dutch social rental sector often serves as an example for other countries as a result of its large share and good quality housing. However, many things have changed in the sector in recent years. After 2011, the central government has regained its control over the housing associations. This was needed after the unacceptable amount of scandals that characterized Dutch social housing after 2000. Unfortunately, some of the new housing policies direct the sector into the direction of a residualization (the sector becomes smaller and there is a larger concentration of lower income groups). This is undesirable because the challenges that housing associations have to face are bigger than ever. Housing shortages are increasing, housing affordability is under pressure and spatial segregation is growing.

This paper reflects on the different faces of asset-based welfare from both a theoretical and an empirical perspective. It shows that asset-based welfare can be perceived as a lever for welfare state restructuring but also as an instrument for poverty eradication. In most countries, asset-based welfare policies focus on stimulating home-ownership. The general idea is that by becoming a homeowner, households build up equity that can be released for care and pension purposes in old age. However, there are signs that such policies increase inequality between homeowners (depending on the location of the dwelling and/or the period in which it was bought), but particularly so between homeowners and tenants. We therefore contend that home-ownership based welfare policies need a clear and fundamental specification of the role of the government: how to deal with housing market risks and how to prevent politically unacceptable levels of inequality and exclusion?